October 9, 2024

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As Diamond Sports Group continues to shed baseball teams, MLB is stepping up to produce broadcasts. Three teams just joined the list, including two playoff squads. We explore the sport’s rapidly shifting RSN landscape, the options teams face, and how broad MLB’s broadcast ambitions might become.

— Eric Fisher [[link removed]], David Rumsey [[link removed]], and Colin Salao [[link removed]]

More MLB Teams Shift to League Broadcasts Due to DSG Disarray [[link removed]]

D. Ross Cameron-Imagn Images

Player free agency in Major League Baseball won’t begin until after the World Series. But in a newly crowded free-agent market for teams’ local media rights, the league has already doubled its roster of clubs beginning in 2025.

MLB said Tuesday it will produce and distribute games starting next season for the Brewers, Guardians, and Twins. The three clubs—including playoff teams this year in Cleveland and Milwaukee and a near-miss in Minnesota—each had prior contracts with the bankrupt Diamond Sports Group expire with the end of the 2024 regular season. They will join the Diamondbacks, Padres, and Rockies in MLB’s collection of clubs for which it is handling local media rights, and in each situation, league officials will lead efforts to strike various local distribution agreements and develop an in-market, direct-to-consumer streaming offering.

With the move, the Guardians in particular will expand their local broadcast reach from about 1.45 million households to 4.86 million, while the Twins will grow from a reach of about 1.08 million homes to a new total of 4.4 million.

“With the media landscape continuing to evolve, Major League Baseball is committed to serving our fans by ensuring they can see their favorite clubs, removing blackouts where we can, and ultimately growing the reach of our games,” MLB deputy commissioner Noah Garden said in a statement.

Decision Time

The clubs’ choice to go with the league option for local broadcasts arrives just days after DSG said it intends to shed nearly all of its baseball coverage [[link removed]], a large-scale move set to render significant impacts on the sport [[link removed]]. With a growing number of teams similarly thrust back on the market, there are three primary options before them:

Return to DSG. This move would require dramatically reduced rights fees, similar to what the NBA and NHL recently did [[link removed]], and brings on the risk that DSG might not emerge from bankruptcy. DSG, however, has sought to renegotiate with clubs. Go with the MLB option. This choice likely offers the most certainty that games will be produced professionally and reach the maximum number of fans. But it also typically requires a revenue hit compared to the traditional regional sports network model. Strike an independent arrangement. A growing number of NBA and NHL teams are moving in this direction [[link removed]], based heavily on local, over-the-air television. MLB’s Rangers, another team that recently finished a DSG contract, are reportedly [[link removed]]looking into launching their own RSN, and MLB confirmed Tuesday the club will not return to the company. There is more team control in this option but also significantly more upfront work.

Before the end of the regular season, the Twins told Front Office Sports they were considering each of those options [[link removed]].

As the MLB local media situation evolves, DSG is also nearing a naming rights deal with sports betting giant FanDuel [[link removed]] for its RSN, while it also seeks more financing for its reorganization.

Why WNBA Finals Are Threading the Needle During Peak Sports TV [[link removed]]

Gregory Fisher-Imagn Images

The Minnesota Lynx and Connecticut Sun face off Tuesday with a trip to the WNBA Finals on the line.

Their reward for securing a spot in the finals? A 48-hour turnaround.

The winner of Tuesday night’s matchup will play the New York Liberty in Brooklyn on Thursday night. When the Liberty finished off the two-time defending champion Aces on Sunday, star forward Breanna Stewart seemed happier about avoiding a Game 5 than she was about clinching.

“This playoff schedule is extremely condensed,” Stewart said. “If you go to Game 5, you have one day to prepare for Game 1 of the Finals. That’s insane.”

The WNBA is far from perfect, but in this regard, there’s only so much the league can do about its playoff schedule—for now. It is trying to navigate the crowded broadcast windows it has to compete with during football season, the MLB playoffs, and the start of NBA and NHL seasons.

Game 2 of the Finals is scheduled for Sunday afternoon at 3 p.m. Eastern, smack in the heart of the NFL window.

The broadcast schedule feels like a missed opportunity for a league still making steep year-on-year viewership gains despite the significant drop-off since Caitlin Clark’s Indiana Fever were knocked out [[link removed]]. But ESPN, which has exclusive WNBA playoff TV rights, broadcasts a full Saturday slate of college football games; earlier in the playoffs, it was airing MLB’s wild-card games. What it does not have is weekend NFL rights.

The end result is that ESPN’s best window for the WNBA ends up being Sunday afternoons.

For the WNBA, the solution is coming in 2026, once its new $200 million per year media-rights deal [[link removed]] kicks in. ESPN has owned the exclusive rights to the WNBA playoffs since 2003, but the new deal distributes playoff games to NBCUniversal and Amazon as well, which will allow the WNBA more opportunities to avoid NFL windows.

In past years, teams have had breaks from three days to a week between playoff series, partially due to the broadcast windows, but the league doesn’t want too long of a break between rounds, either, with the constant juggling of broadcast windows being a regular challenge for the league to navigate.

Under the new deal, ESPN networks will air two first-round series every year while Prime Video and NBCU will each receive one series. The semifinals and Finals will rotate between the three partners over the 11-year deal.

Even ESPN president of content Burke Magnus recognized additional distribution partners are essential for the nascent league.

“I really believe [the WNBA] could continue to use a wider distribution on platforms that appeal to different audiences to help cement that growth and not just have it be a spike,” Magnus told Front Office Sports at ESPN’s media day in August. “That would have been my recommendation if I was their consultant, so I’m glad it worked out that way.”

Dodging the NFL

When Clark made her much-awaited WNBA playoff debut, the entire nation had a chance to tune in. Disney broadcast Game 1 of the first-round series between the Fever and Sun on ABC, an over-the-air network.

Over-the-air networks allow for a larger distribution than cable channels. An additional 11 games on ABC [[link removed]] is a key reason why Monday Night Football saw a 29% increase [[link removed]] in viewership last season.

Clark’s playoff debut delivered, drawing an average of 1.8 million viewers [[link removed]], the league’s most-watched playoff game since 2000. But just three days later, Clark and the Fever’s elimination game loss, despite airing on ESPN, drew 2.5 million viewers, the most-watched WNBA game on cable [[link removed]].

The key difference is Game 2, which was played on a Wednesday, was not competing with the NFL, while Game 1 aired at 3 p.m. ET on a Sunday, right in the middle of Week 2’s midday slate.

And it wasn’t just Clark and the Fever. The opening game of the other three first-round series averaged about 425,000 viewers that Sunday on ESPN, but the Game 2s, which ESPN aired on a Tuesday and Wednesday, averaged 1.02 million viewers.

The trend continued even after Clark was eliminated, as last Sunday’s semifinals Game 1 between the Liberty and Aces averaged 929,000 viewers on ABC at 3 p.m. ET, while Game 2 on Tuesday night and Game 3 on Friday night on ESPN2 drew 969,000 and 994,000 viewers, respectively—two of the most-watched WNBA games on ESPN2, just behind Clark’s debut in May.

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LIV Golf’s Shadow Looms Over Ryder Cup As Captains Address Challenges [[link removed]]

PGA of America

Still nearly a year out from the 2025 Ryder Cup, LIV Golf’s disruption of the sport is staying top of mind for those most invested in the iconic team event.

Captains from the U.S. and European teams addressed LIV’s impact on the Ryder Cup at a media event in New York City on Tuesday, as they previewed next year’s action, which will take place Sept. 26–28 at Bethpage Black Golf Course on Long Island.

While there are no specific bans on LIV members from either team ( unlike the Presidents Cup [[link removed]]), the controversial tour continues to complicate the logistics of filling out each squad. One factor impacting both sides is players not earning Official World Golf Ranking points at LIV tournaments. That makes it much harder for someone like Bryson DeChambeau or Jon Rahm to earn one of the six automatic qualifying spots for their respective teams. And that leaves their most likely path to selection via a captain’s pick, of which both teams have six.

“I’m going to take the 12 best players,” U.S. captain Keegan Bradley said. “So, if we feel like there’s a few guys there [from LIV], one guy, two guys, whatever it is, then we’re gonna do that.” Last month, the PGA of America, which is not affiliated with the PGA Tour, reaffirmed LIV players would remain eligible for the U.S. Ryder Cup team [[link removed]].

Europe’s DP World Tour Dilemma

For Team Europe, though, it’s not as black and white. Players—and any vice or assistant captains—must be members of the DP World Tour, from which many LIV players resigned to avoid fines they would receive for playing in LIV events without permission. Luke Donald was a late substitute as Europe’s captain in 2023 after Henrik Stenson, previously tabbed for the role, joined LIV.

Rahm, who is still at odds with the DP World Tour over said fines (Sports Illustrated reported they are in the neighborhood of $1 million [[link removed]]), recently played in two tour events to stay in good standing. “It was great to see Jon do what he needed to do to remain eligible,” Donald said.

Donald said he’s been in “constant communication” with Rahm and other LIV players, including Tyrrell Hatton, who won last week’s Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, and Sergio García, who is considering rejoining the DP World Tour. “He’s certainly very interested in doing that,” Donald said of García, the 2017 Masters champion. “He understands everything that’s involved. The decision has to go to him, whether he’s prepared to do all that.”

FRONT OFFICE SPORTS TODAY Jets Shake-Up: Saleh Out

FOS illustration

Tuesday began with a bombshell as the 2–3 Jets announced they were firing head coach Robert Saleh, who was “blindsided” by the announcement. Former NFL executive Andrew Brandt joins the show to discuss what this means for the Jets, Aaron Rodgers, and Davante Adams.

Plus, Allyson Felix joins the show to discuss some major developments in the world of track and women’s sports at large. Felix is adding a new chapter to her legacy with the launch of the first sports management firm completely focused on female athletes.

Watch, listen, and subscribe on Apple [[link removed]], Spotify [[link removed]], and YouTube [[link removed]].

FRONT OFFICE SPORTS EVENTS

The Rise of Women’s Athletics

Women’s sports are breaking attendance and viewership records, and there is no sign of slowing down.

Join us [[link removed]] Oct. 16 at 1 p.m. ET for Future of Sports: Women’s Sports as we discuss the rise of women’s sports, the companies investing in them, how female athletes can capitalize on their own brand, media-rights opportunities, and more.

This four-part virtual event will unpack how teams, brands, leagues, and properties are shaping the future of women’s sports, fostering innovation, and championing a new era of inclusivity and excellence.

Register now [[link removed]].

Conversation Starters Athlos introduced running bibs specifically designed to fit a woman’s frame during its inaugural event last month. Take a look [[link removed]]. Shams Charania is headed to ESPN to replace Adrian Wojnarowski as the network’s NBA insider. Listen to Front Office Sports media guru Michael McCarthy’s breakdown of how it happened [[link removed]]. MLS set a new regular-season attendance record of more than 11 million fans, and there are still 16 matches left [[link removed]]. Editors’ Picks Big 12’s Brett Yormark Doesn’t ‘Wake Up Thinking’ About SEC, Big Ten [[link removed]]by Amanda Christovich [[link removed]]Big 12’s commissioner says he isn’t concerned about reports of a Big Ten–SEC scheduling alliance. Judge Rejects NBA’s Request to Seal WBD Digital Streaming Deal [[link removed]]by Alex Schiffer [[link removed]]The league could still request specific redactions. NBA GMs Rank Salary-Cap Apron As Rule That Needs to Change Most [[link removed]]by Colin Salao [[link removed]]Schedule changes finished second with 17% of the vote. Question of the Day

Have you held off on watching a WNBA playoff game specifically because it was on at the same time as an NFL game?

YES [[link removed]] NO [[link removed]]

Tuesday’s result: Only 15% of respondents said they have attended an MLS game since Lionel Messi joined the league.

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